Yesterday the "moth man" came for round two of our fumigation -- the last one, fortunately. Just like last time, we had to leave the flat and be gone for 2-3 hours. To make things more challenging, it was rainy and damp outside and Olga was not enthusiastic about walking anywhere.
So we ambled down to the High Street and went to brunch at the Alice House restaurant, where I had a kale-sweet potato-sausage hash. Olga curled up under the table on her towel and seemed quite happy just to be warm and dry. I ran a few errands nearby, picking up the next two volumes of Karl Ove Knausgaard's memoirs at the bookstore and dropping off some cleaning -- and we managed to kill our two hours of time.
By then the weather had cleared up a bit, so while Dave went home I took Olga to the cemetery. She was a wild thing, happily chasing squirrels with abandon.
I don't know about you, but this is the kind of thing that drives me crazy. Not only is it litter, but it's perfectly good clothing that has been needlessly abandoned beside a footpath where I walk the dog. This was only part of it -- there was another pile nearby.
I've read that in our era of "fast fashion," or cheap imported clothing available at low prices, things get worn and discarded so quickly that municipal waste disposal systems struggle to keep up. Apparently there are people out there who are so obsessed with themselves that if they're shown on Instagram wearing any given item, they then feel they have to throw it away. Studies have shown people buy twice as much clothing today as they did ten years ago.
Anyway, I have no idea what was going on with this particular assortment, but I picked it all up, put it in a trash bag, and brought it home...
...where I ran it through the washer, dried it and folded it. (Because I didn't have enough laundry to do this weekend -- ha!) Then I took it to Oxfam. There was nothing wrong with any of it -- no obvious holes, tears or stains, nothing inappropriately intimate. Some of it was in dubious taste, filmy zebra prints and that sort of thing, but to each his (or in this case her) own, right?
Anyway, hopefully it will now find a second life.
I applaud you for rescuing those clothes and for donating them to a worthy charity. I guess you didn't have time to iron them or perhaps your iron is broken? We have a spare iron if you would like it.
ReplyDeleteI don't even iron my OWN clothes! :)
ReplyDeleteBravo to you for taking charge of the clothes and giving them to a good cause! I'm so impressed.
ReplyDeleteSteve Reed- you are a GOOD man.
ReplyDeleteWell done, Steve! I love that you gathered up that stuff, washed it, and donated it. We pass by piles of clothing like this all the time here. Usually by the second day it is gone.
ReplyDeleteI love that picture of the cemetery and proud of you for retrieving the clothing. we buy very little clothing and wear it until it's ragged. of course, we don't got to a job every day at this point in our lives or have meetings with people. but even when we did, we only had a limited wardrobe since our work was in our shop so mostly we wore shop clothes. we did work in houses who had closets bigger than our bedroom and full of clothes. so many clothes they can't have been worn even once a year. and not cheap or 'fast'. I've wondered how much money any one of those closets represented.
ReplyDeleteI love this, great job Steve!
ReplyDeleteHere the homeless leave clothes . They have no place to wash clothes so get new clothes from Value village and just change into clean clothes. they'd never thing to put the old clothes in the garbage.
ReplyDeleteWhen my daughter was at university in Boston there were always students who majored in shopping and then left bags of unworn clothing at the end of the year. Outrageous waste of time and money! I hope the school donated it all.
ReplyDeleteThank you for rescuing the unwanted clothing, laundering it giving it to Oxfam.
You're a good person to do that. The whole clothes shopping thing has become unbearable to me. I'm pretty sure that if I can maintain my current weight, I won't ever have to buy anything, except maybe for underwear.
ReplyDeleteYou really are a good person for washing those clothes and taking them to Oxfam. I never throw old clothes away unless they are so ragged that no one would want them. I either take them to a resale store and to Goodwill or Salvation Army.
ReplyDeleteI love that photo from the cemetery. It looks disorganized with all those leaves covering the ground.
It makes a person wonder what the backstory is to those clothes. Maybe it's nothing interesting, just sloth! Good for you for rescuing them. That is a great cemetery shot. Is the moth treatment for the brand-new carpet???
ReplyDeleteIf that red one is a Hawaiian shirt, you could have sent it to me. Anyway bravo to you for your act of thoughtfulness.
ReplyDeleteThat is the loveliest activity ! Thank you, you wonderful thoughtful man. Clothing is rarely left on the street here, so many homeless to toss everything they find onto their trolleys. We are encouraged to leave winter coats at the "camp".Olga is such a good sport- nice that you can take her for lunch.
ReplyDeleteThat was a wonderful thing to do with the clothing and I'm sure at least some of it will find a new home.
ReplyDeleteMajor kudos for this kindness, Steve! Thank you for caring enough to do that! I have never seen clothes lying discarded like that and I am amazed that it's happening, but it is good people like you that can do a responsible thing to offset the balance. The cemetery photo is very nice, I quite like it!
ReplyDeleteI'd like to have a closer look at that sweater. Can you run down to Oxfam & see if it's still there? Ha! You really are the best.
ReplyDelete